Sherman, William Tecumseh

Life Span
to
    Full name
    William Tecumseh Sherman
    Place of Birth
    Burial Place
    Birth Date Certainty
    Exact
    Death Date Certainty
    Exact
    Gender
    Male
    Race
    White
    Sectional choice
    North
    Origins
    Free State
    No. of Spouses
    1
    No. of Children
    8
    Family
    Charles R. Sherman (father), Mary Hoyt (mother), Ellen Ewing (wife), John Sherman (brother)
    Education
    West Point (US Military Academy)
    Occupation
    Military
    Businessman
    Military
    US military (Pre-Civil War)
    Union Army
    US military (Post-Civil War)

    William Tecumseh Sherman (American National Biography)

    Scholarship
    [William] Sherman came out of the war with the success he had always craved. He enjoyed his popularity but wanted only to go back to the army and society as he remembered them before secession. However, the war had changed the United States, and the Reconstruction following the war was a difficult time. Sherman supported the old-line leaders in the South. Though he knew slavery was dead, he thought that the freed people should be kept in a subordinate status. When Andrew Johnson tried to use him in his battle with Congress, Sherman refused to become involved, insisting that the only answer to the imbroglio was a return to the prewar years.

    When [Ulysses S.] Grant became president in 1869, Sherman succeeded him as commanding general, a post he was to keep until his retirement. He found the job frustrating. Grant did not support him in his battle with the secretary of war over command jurisdiction, causing a rupture in their friendship that was never totally healed. He was regularly upset as Congress continually cut army strength and military salaries. Politicians ignored his military counsel, even when it came to waging the difficult American Indian wars. As a result, Sherman left Washington whenever he could, spending a year on tour in Europe and the Middle East (1871-1872) and another eighteen months (1874-1876) in St. Louis. He particularly enjoyed visiting the West, and in 1879 he received a friendly welcome when he revisited scenes of his wartime exploits in the South.
    John F. Marszalek, "Sherman, William Tecumseh," American National Biography Online, February 2000, http://www.anb.org/articles/05/05-00706.html.
    Date Event
    William T. Sherman writes to his wife from Louisiana about the election
    William T. Sherman writes to his wife from Louisiana that she stay in Ohio
    Congressman John Sherman urges his brother William to return to Ohio from Louisiana
    - The first pitched battle of the war between armies results in a Union disaster at Bull Run
    Robert Anderson, hero of Fort Sumter, takes command of Kentucky's military forces
    William Tecumseh Sherman takes command of the Department of the Cumberland, replacing Robert Anderson
    Largest U.S. Fleet ever assembled sails from Norfolk, Virginia to blockade and harass the Confederate coast
    - The South Atlantic Blockading Squadron runs into a storm on its way to South Carolina and ships are lost
    Massed Confederate forces attack the Union's Army of the Tennessee at Pittsburg Landing
    At Pittsburg Landing, Union reinforcements turn the tide on the second day of the Battle of Shiloh
    Grant's Union Army captures Jackson, the state capital of Mississippi
    Union forces withdraw from the Mississippi state capital of Jackson after inflicting heavy damage
    On the Mississippi, the Union's Army of the Tennessee completely surrounds Vicksburg
    The Union's Army of the Tennessee attempts the storming of Vicksburg but is beaten back
    Second Union attempt to take Vicksburg by infantry assault ends in bloody failure with 500 dead
    After twice failing to storm the city, Union General Grant orders a siege at Vicksburg, Mississippi
    - In Mississippi, the Siege of Vicksburg continues
    General Ulysses S. Grant fires his troublesome and ambitious subordinate, James A. McClernand
    Confederate General, and Episcopal bishop, Leonidas Polk is killed in action in Georgia
    In Georgia, Sherman's direct assault on Confederate positions on Kennesaw Mountain fails with heavy losses
    At the Battle of Atlanta, the Union's Army of the Tennessee defeats Confederate attempts to defend the city
    - Union forces break the last Confederate efforts to defend Atlanta at the Battle of Jonesborough
    The Union's Army of the Tennessee captures Atlanta, boosting northern morale and Republican prospects
    In Georgia, General W.T. Sherman and his 62,000 men march out of a burning Atlanta, heading for the sea
    Near Savannah, Georgia, Fort McAllister falls to Union troops and Sherman makes contact with the U.S. Navy
    - In Georgia, Confederate troops evacuate Savannah and Sherman's "March to the Sea" is complete
    In North Carolina, CSA General J. E. Johnston opens surrender talks with Union General W. T. Sherman
    General W.T. Sherman, negotiating Confederate surrender in North Carolina, makes a political blunder
    In North Carolina, against orders, CSA General J. E. Johnston surrenders the entire Army of the Tennessee
    In Washington D.C., the second day of the Grand Review sees General Sherman's army parade through the city
    The Great North-Western Sanitary Fair opens in Chicago, Illinois
    The Great North-Western Sanitary Fair closes in Chicago, Illinois having raised $270,000
    In Washington, Mary E. Walker is awarded the Medal of Honor for her services as a Union wartime nurse
    In Kansas, Cheyenne and Lakota warriors wipe out a U.S. Army detail of twelve men.
    In Kansas, Seventh Cavalry scouts find the bodies of Lieutenant Kidder's patrol killed two weeks before.
    The U.S. Congress authorizes an Indian Peace Commission to negotiate with hostile Plains Indian tribes.
    The Indian Peace Commission, newly appointed to negotiate with hostile Plains Indian tribes, organizes in St. Louis, Missouri.
    The Indian Peace Commission meets with Sioux tribal leaders near Fort Thompson in South Dakota.
    Chicago Style Entry Link
    Glatthaar, Joseph T. The March to the Sea and Beyond: Sherman's Troops in the Savannah and Carolinas Campaigns. New York: New York University Press, 1985.
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    Sherman, William T. Memoirs of General William T. Sherman. 2 vols. New York: D. Appleton and Co., 1875.
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    Trudeau, Noah Andre. Southern Storm: Sherman's March to the Sea. New York: Harper, 2008.
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    Marszalek, John F. Sherman: A Soldier's Passion for Order. New York: Free Press, 1993.


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    Bailey, Anne J. The Chessboard of War: Sherman and Hood in the Autumn Campaigns of 1864. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2000. view record
    Bower, Stephen E. “The Theology of the Battlefield: William Tecumseh Sherman and the U.S. Civil War.” Journal of Military History 64, no. 4(2000): 1005-1034. view record
    Fellman, Michael. Citizen Sherman: A Life of William Tecumseh Sherman. New York: Random House, 1995. view record
    Flood, Charles Bracelen. Grant and Sherman: The Friendship that won the Civil War. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005. view record
    Sherman, William Tecumseh and Walter L. Fleming. General W.T. Sherman as College President: A Collection of Letters, Documents, and Other Material, Chiefly from Private sources, Relating to the Life and Activities of General William Tecumseh Sherman, to the Early Years of Louisiana State University, and to the Stirring Conditions Existing in the South on the Eve of the Civil War, 1859-1861. Cleveland, OH: The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1912. view record
    Woodworth, Steven E. Sherman. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. view record
    How to Cite This Page: "Sherman, William Tecumseh," House Divided: The Civil War Research Engine at Dickinson College, https://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/node/6570.